Make Email Attachments Safe

Email attachments continue to be the single biggest threat to your organisation’s cyber security.

In 183 million phishing simulations conducted by Proofpoint customers this year, almost one in six recipients of a suspicious phishing email failed to protect their organisation’s valuable data. Employees either clicked a malicious link, performed a bogus password reset, or downloaded malware or ransomware.

With such a high and persistent risk of cyber incursion, organisations increasingly require more from their file transfers than standard email attachments can provide. They need a smarter, more reliable way to send files, stay secure, and meet the needs of their clients, compliance mandates, and industry regulations.

Managed File Transfer (MFT) future-proofs an organisation’s ability to send and receive files quickly, breaking free of the constraints of email attachments, and maintaining cyber security.

Problem: Size Caps

Most email applications cap the size of email attachments to 25 MB. That may have been “big enough” a couple of decades ago… but no longer. Now, a single high-resolution image can easily exceed 25Mb.

Sending an entire folder typically requires zipping it to condense its contents. However, splitting ZIP files into chunks less than 25Mb is a time-consuming hassle.

Problem: Insecure

Even when successfully sent, email attachments pose ongoing security risks. They can be forwarded to unintended users. Worse, a single recipient with an infected device can infect the attachment with malware and spread it to others.

On top of that, there’s always a possibility that an employee could send an email to the wrong person, or mistakenly send sensitive information outside of their network, causing compliance issues for your organisation.

Problem: Indiscriminate

If an attachment message originates internally, the protocol to keep sensitive data safe (or how to determine what sensitive data is) is often not widely disseminated or used. Encrypting attachments, one effective mechanism, can be tricky for casual users and implemented inconsistently, undermining its reliability as a whole-of-organisation solution.

Problem: Degraded Performance

Too many attachments can clog your inbox archive and slow backup processes. Some file types such as DLLs, JARs, and SOs may be completely blocked by email systems, disrupting business processes.

Unpacking endless ZIP files also depletes available server resources.

GoAnywhere MFT to the Rescue

Email attachments have their place. But too often they’re a far from ideal way to move data, failing to provide the efficiency, agility, speed, and protection companies need when sending the files that underpin their business.

That’s where GoAnywhere MFT can help.

Solution: No Size Limits

Providing a secure alternative to emailing files, the Secure Mail module in GoAnywhere MFT enables employees and other authorised users to easily send files. It’s much more secure than traditional email, and doesn’t limit file sizes or types.

GoAnywhere not only frees your organisation from file size constraints, it also includes accelerated file transfer technologies which speed files to their destinations. Patented UDP file transfer technology enables even the largest files to be sent without incident from anywhere in the world.

GoAnywhere’s MFT agent also helps ensure large batch files get to their destination with auto-resume and integrity checks, ensuring all of your message gets there in one piece, despite any network connectivity issues along the way.

And if a network connectivity issue prevents the file being successfully transferred, GoAnywhere’s comprehensive alerts ensure you’ll know immediately.

Solution: Secure Encrypted Sends

Encryption is built into GoAnywhere. Any files sent are automatically encrypted end-to-end using one of a range of encryption protocols, including Open PGP, SFTP, FTPS, AS2 or AS4, and ZIP with AES.

GoAnywhere also enables password protection for the attached downloads in case they are sent to the wrong recipient.

Additionally, Secure Folders provide a place where your team can safely collaborate.

Solution: Bottleneck Buster

Lag, inefficiencies and other performance inhibitors are nullified GoAnywhere’s load balancing. Managed transfers help maximise uptime, and clustering functionality distributes files across your network, so they get there in the fastest time and with the least amount of disruption.

Solution: Seamless Integration with Inbound Protection

By combining GoAnywhere MFT with Clearswift in our Threat Protection Bundle, organisations can create layered cyber defences which enable their teams to receive and share information securely without impairing their productivity.

It seamlessly integrates MFT with advanced threat protection and adaptive data loss prevention to keep your sensitive data secure. Not only does it prevent malware from entering your organisation, it also prevents employees from losing or mishandling data.

For example, if an employee knowingly (or unknowingly) attempts to share any files containing malware, those files are sanitised by having the malicious elements automatically removed.

The SFT Threat Protection Bundle can also automatically detect and - if you configure it to do so - prevent employees from sharing sensitive information.

If you’d like to discuss how your organisation’s file transfers can be made more secure and efficient, please feel welcome to contact me, Bradley Copson (mail to:bradley@gensys.com.au).

I’m always happy to have an obligation-free discussion, explain how simply we can transition you from outdated software and approaches, and offer you a zero-cost Proof of Concept.

At Generic Systems Australia, we’re your local experts in secure Managed File Transfer.